Monday, June 29, 2009

My buddy Capt. Joe Finelli has come up with another brilliant variation on a theme: the Toonerville Trolley. Again, this hammers home his ability as an artist as well as the need for manufacturers to do a little "out of box" thinking. Not everything needs to be a 400E or 200 series boxcar!!! I'll keep posting these brilliant creations as I see 'em. I know there are plenty more out there waiting to be found! Thanks again Joe for sending the pics. Keep up the amazing work! You are an inspiration!

Dave Hess posted a really nice little Youtube of a rare McCoy Handcar rolling around on a standard gauge layout. I hope he can post more of these wonderful little videos of McCoy gear making the rounds. He's inspired me to make a few on layout as well....

Pretty sweet. New England Toy Train Exchange has an exciting auction coming up with some classic Voltamp like this. I've seen about a dozen questions in the last week; "What is Voltamp?". In a very small nutshell, some of the earliest and most innovative electric toy trains.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

What's interesting about these cars is that they were overpainted at the factory. From the little scratches on the cars, you can see that there is typical Lionel Apple Green underneath. Yet these cars are not refinished, the orange you see is orange from the factory. I have these cars in Mojave (a light brown I guess) as well as MTH flavors in Green. They are some of the best all purpose passenger cars on a pike, largely because they aren't as ostentatious as State cars and they can handle smaller radius pikes with ease. I'll post some additional pics later on.

Pipes71479 posted some great Youtube of Standard Gauge American Flyer sets running. I've started a small Flyer Standard Gauge collection myself because the lithography is just amazing and I don't think the Flyer stuff will really get reproduced anytime soon. Plus its' just plain neat. Check it out:

I wish the auto manufacturers still made cars like this. One could argue that modern amenities and electronics make current automobiles much more exciting. But these are still around and well, still simply like modern works of art in metal. I hope my country can produce items like this again....

Was hanging out last weekend at the Connecticut Air Museum; check out this B-29. You have to see this plane up close to understand how incredible it is. Nope, it isn't a standard gauge train but if you want to have a great time and see some real WW II planes, this is one great stop on the travel roster!Marc

Here is a great shot from a TTOS Meeting on June 7th, 2009. This set is a bit unusual. It's a a great set regardless because of the solid boxes and the general high quality of the set. More pics later...

Martin also sent me a pic of his 199 Dealer layout. Good things come in small packages. I love these little layouts. I can only imagine the personality of their creators. Damn this is great innovation packed into a small space!

Martin sent me this awesome pics of his 400e's. Yes, the top is an original crackle black 400e. It in fact does exist. Wouldn't you have just loved to been in the Lionel factory when the guy figured out how to do this crackle black paint? I would have really loved to see this technique on some other trains of the time as well as rolling stock. I have a crackle black MTH 400e and it is really nice, I can't imagine how nice an original prewar Lionel flavor is.

Thanks for sending Martin! Martin and Rob Lear sent me a few other pics I'll post shortly!Marc

Hi All, was just hanging out this weekend at the Connecticut Air Museum and I hopped over to the Trolley Museum for a quick stop. I've seen this in standard gauge from Bob McCoy Sr. and Jr.. Very cool little switcher. I'll post some pics of the trolleys as well.